Videoscape Exec Quietly Exits as Cisco Reconfigures Video Strategy

The VAR Guy is hearing through the grapevine that Enrique Rodriguez, the former Microsoft executive in charge of Cisco's Videoscape TV-based teleconferencing solution, has departed the company. What's more, his departure comes alongside news that Cisco has combined its service provider and enterprise video business.

The VAR Guy is hearing through the grapevine that Enrique Rodriguez, the former Microsoft executive in charge of Cisco’s Videoscape TV-based teleconferencing solution, has departed the company. What’s more, his departure comes alongside news that Cisco has combined its service provider and enterprise video business. It all raises the question: What’s going on with Cisco’s video business? Here’s a look.

Rodriguez’s departure was first reported by Light Reading Cable, which also confirmed the shifts at Cisco. Apparently, the reason for his resignation isn’t publicly known, but one source says it was due to a “power struggle centered on the future direction of Cisco’s video division.”

That combined service provider and enterprise video business will be headed by Marthin De Beer, currently the SVP of Cisco’s Emerging Business Group. Cisco claims Rodriguez’s departure and the combining of the two businesses won’t affect the launch of Videoscape or any of its other video technologies.

Here’s Cisco’s official statement that’s been making the rounds:

“We believe this move will spur innovation and synergies across Cisco’s end-to-end video portfolio, which spans service provider, enterprise and consumer networks, and enable Cisco and our customers to introduce compelling new video services, applications and experiences with speed and agility.”

Industry watchers don’t need to be told that Cisco’s video efforts are very often a mess: Between killing the Flip and the fiasco-in-a-box that is the Umi, more often it seems as though Cisco has lost its way. And while those are consumer efforts, Cisco’s efforts to capitalize on the business teleconferencing markets have yet to impress.

Could this reorganization effort be Cisco’s attempts to get back in the video saddle – or is it Custer’s last stand?

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